


Wrong Turn

by bob_fish



Series: Wrong Turn 'verse [4]
Category: Fullmetal Alchemist
Genre: Gen, M/M, UST
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2009-08-02
Updated: 2009-08-02
Packaged: 2017-10-14 15:48:49
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 13,313
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/150906
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bob_fish/pseuds/bob_fish
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p><em>This really was turning out to be a day of surprises, thought Roy.</em></p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Contains action, peril, mockery, cheap jokes and unresolved sexual tension. 

It had all gone so utterly wrong so quickly.

Roy hadn't been worried when, only a few minutes before, he'd been leading his small group of men down into the tunnels following Fullmetal's tip-off. He hadn't really been worried either, when, as he'd anticipated, they found Edward already in the middle of a five-to-one fight. He'd perhaps been a little concerned when Fullmetal had yelled, incoherent and ungrateful, that Al was in worse trouble, that they should go, get out of his face, help his brother. But his head was cooler than Ed’s, and once he'd relinquished Hawkeye and a couple of his men, he wasn't worried at all. Edward seemed to forget it sometimes (was it elder brother's pride?) but Alphonse was practically invulnerable, an even better fighter than his brother, and nearly as impressive an alchemist. Against a gang of ordinary thugs like this, and with the aid of an exemplary sharpshooter - well, concern was unnecessary. And so when one of the men they were fighting - the tall one, with something suspiciously chimerical about his appearance - had slipped away from the action, Roy had followed after him without a moment's hesitation. So quickly, in fact, that it took him a good few seconds of quiet pursuit to realise why he'd done it. He would shadow the man just long enough to work out if he was fleeing in panic or to alert his comrades. Then, depending, Roy would either flash-fry his opponent enough to get him scared and pump him for a little information, or he would carry on shadowing him until he knew which way he'd need to lead his men to find the heart of the organisation. 

He hadn't even been worried when he realised, a moment later, that he didn't know if any of his men had noticed him slip away, or what way he'd gone. A little sloppy of him. He was too used to having Hawkeye at his side, noticing everything without being told - but it didn't really matter. This was hardly going to take long. 

For a short while longer, things went smoothly. His quarry picked up a little speed. Yes, definitely some kind of chimera, Roy decided. There was something off about the shape of his back, the set of his ears, the sound of his quick breathing. Dog? Wolf, maybe? He took a left turn. Roy gave it a moment, then followed, jogged quietly round the corner - and found himself suddenly face to face with his quarry. The chimera was standing a little way down the tall, narrow corridor, head forward, nose distended into a wolfish snout, showing his teeth. Ready to fight. Ah. He'd known he was being followed. How? Of course, wolf. Canine hearing. Roy found he'd snapped before he finished his train of thought. The burst of flame was small, a warning shot. Size up your opponent. After all this effort, he was still hoping to get some information he could use. The wolf-man snarled, bolted for him. Roy snapped again, and the chimera ran straight into a wall of flame, recoiling with a howl as it vanished.

Footsteps sounded from behind the chimera, shouts. Roy aimed another bolt of flame high at the dark ceiling of the tunnel ahead, counted as the running figures were briefly lit up. Two? Three? He was concentrating properly now, watchful, feeling the adrenaline, and a little irritated with how this was going. The chimera pushed himself to his feet, charged for him again - and this time Roy got him quicker, with a more intense burst intended to drop him - and then snapped again without pausing, aiming a fireball at the spot of darkness where the approaching reinforcements ought to be. 

Then, suddenly, he was lying on his back on the damp ground, ears ringing, no idea how he'd got there. Odd. It was as if someone had taken a pair of scissors and chopped a few frames of film from the last minute. He was in a fight. He needed to get up now, to move. His head felt somehow welded to the floor. It was as if there was a magnet in his skull. He'd hit his head, then. How had he managed to do that? Had he slipped? Someone spoke, close to him. "He's out, but he's breathing." I am not out, thought Roy. You're not even paying attention. Then he passed out.

***  
  
It was too bright. Roy squeezed his eyes shut but it didn't do much for the horrible, splitting ache at the back of his head. He squinted, picked out a string of bare bulbs and a concrete ceiling, and turned his head to one side, to see if that was any better. It wasn't. The motion of turning made him suddenly, intensely nauseous. He managed not to retch, rode it out, listening to the voices he could hear carrying, echoing across the room.

After a few moments, the sickness subsided enough for it to be worth trying to get his brain working. Concussion, he managed. He'd been fighting the chimera, he'd fired at the reinforcements, and then – what? He definitely hadn't slipped over, which was good, because that would have been mortifying. It had been a blow to the back of the head - had someone come from behind, taken advantage of his distraction to crack him on the head? That was a sharp move on their part. His fighting style was long-distance, and it needed his concentration. He was always vulnerable to an enemy smart enough to get in close to him, where it was far more difficult to use his flames, where they could use an advantage of height and weight, or try to disarm him. Ah. His gloves. They hadn't left them on, of course. His hands were bare against the concrete floor. But had they got the spare pair tucked inside his jacket? He should check as soon as he could.

So, his brain seemed to be working, then. That was good. The headache was still there, but the sickness was better. He cracked an eye open, looked for the source of the voices, picked out a group of figures over the other side of the room. Focusing on them made the pain in his head worse. He tried anyway. Three of them. A thin man, sitting on a pile of crates and dangling his legs. Another, leaning with his back to Roy. And was that the wolf-man, curled on the floor? He seemed to be down. Good. The odds were improving a little. The two other men were talking fiercely, both of them looking away from Roy. Better. Hadn't there been a fourth man, back in the tunnels? Roy rolled his head slowly and cautiously to look at the other side of the room. It was bare and empty apart from a chair and a closed door. There didn't seem to be anyone else in the room. Good again. Roy slid his right hand under his jacket, reaching up to the inside pocket. Ah. Damn. His jacket was already open, and the spare gloves were gone. This was not good. For the sake of thoroughness, he checked the holster at his right side for his service revolver, but of course that was gone too. So, not only was he unarmed, but his opponents obviously had a modicum of brains. Damn. Another thought struck him, and he reached into his right trouser pocket, and - ha! - his fingers touched on a lead pencil and a thin piece of paper. He pulled it out: the receipt from today's lunch, at that cafe on the little town's main square. Pork chops with paprika. It seemed like a long time ago. With pencil and paper, he could draw an array. So his opponents weren't quite that smart after all, and he wasn't quite unarmed.

Roy held the paper and pencil loosely in his right hand, out of his captors' view, and considered his next move. Fire alchemy was of course best, if he could manage it. Neither of the two uninjured men had been smoking - but if either of them lit a cigarette, he could begin and end the fight in moments. Lacking a spark, he could, if necessary, fall back on the basics. Changes of state: he could raise the temperature, boil the air around them, although that would involve boiling himself along with them. A straightforward decomposition and reconstruction? Outside of revising for annual assessments, he hadn't done anything like that in years. But still, he had a surer eye and much stronger mental focus than in his student days. If it came to it, he was fairly sure he could manage a hole in the wall. But he was no specialist, was never going to be able to manage a real offensive strike like Armstrong's forests of spikes, or Fullmetal's instant polearms.

Decision made, Roy raised his head a little way, painfully, used his right hand to spread the paper out plain side up, and started to draw his arrays. This took rather longer than anticipated. The circles were difficult - the angle was awkward, and Roy was annoyed to find that his hand was shaking, but when he was done they looked workable. He moved on to fire next, sketching out the formula quickly and automatically, like signing his name. Finally, the formula for simple decompositions and reconstructions. He drew a plain and versatile version, not trusting his memory for anything else, and tried to fix the array in his mind as he drew. His task complete, he pocketed the pencil, grasped the paper in his hand and lay back again, savouring the little piece of control he'd regained over this unpleasant situation. Then he rolled his head again to the left, let his eyes fall half-shut, and moved on to his next task: watching and listening for an opportunity.

Fifteen minutes later, he was still watching, tense. His head was pounding again. The burst of adrenaline was wearing off. 

Initially he'd been irritated. Didn't either of these thugs smoke? It was ridiculously bad luck. Petty criminals, mercenaries and other kinds of goon usually smoked like chimneys, in his experience. These idiots were nervous, twitchy - surely they ought be dying to light up?

The next few minutes had been frustrating, but in truth rather useful. Roy had learnt quite a bit about the situation, much of it distinctly heartening. First, that the main battle had already been fought and won by Roy's own side. It seemed that the Elrics had already taken care of the ringleader - who'd incidentally and gratifyingly turned out to be the man Roy had guessed was in charge, a disgruntled State Alchemist, Gregor Milne, who'd worked on military chimerae. God only knows how he'd got some of his former experiments working for him again when they should have been enjoying a little closure by tearing his head off. Milne wasn't a concern now, at any rate. As far as Roy had gleaned, he'd managed to blow himself up while aiming a shoddy offensive transmutation at Alphonse. Half of Milne's gang had been subsequently scooped up in a transmuted concrete holding pen - Fullmetal's handiwork, no doubt. Roy's team must have come in as the brothers were mopping up the remaining gang members, which was doubtless how they had got separated in the tunnels. 

Now, these three were discussing how to make their escape as best they could. They were not agreeing. They were also definitely not all three chimerae. Roy knew this because the stocky man with his back to him was arguing, crudely and vociferously, that they should leave the injured wolf-man, and was using a barrage of insults about chimerae in general to make his point. The thin man, still sitting on the crates but now leaning forward intently, wanted to take the wolf-man with them, both out of some loyalty and because he was seriously underestimating the extent of the latter's burn injuries. Was he a chimera too? It was difficult to tell from this distance. Roy had also discovered why he hadn't been killed on the spot or left where he'd fallen. The thin man was the one who'd cracked his skull for him. He wanted to use Roy as collateral, a hostage to allow them to bargain their way past the military troops to a clear exit. That the thin man even thought this would work showed his ignorance and desperation. Desperation makes people stupid. Another potential advantage Roy could use. And here was another: they weren't watching him closely. They had noticed him moving, but Roy had been discreet enough, and they'd dismissed the movement as semi-conscious shifting, which the thin man had argued was a hopeful sign that Roy was alive enough to bargain with. 

The wolf-man was semi-conscious and indifferent. The other two seemed seconds away from a fight. Roy took a slow breath and got ready to move. The thin man jumped down from his perch on the crates and eyeballed his colleague, standing deliberately too close. Go on, Roy thought. Push him. Like clockwork, the stocky man swore and shoved. The thin man moved forward and pushed back, standing on the balls of his feet. The stocky man ran at him, caught him in the middle with his shoulder, tackled - and Roy moved.

The moment he was on his feet, he realised he'd severely overestimated his readiness for a fight. The room tipped and swayed around him sickenly, but he managed to keep moving, staggered inelegantly to the door. He already had his left hand on the light switch, his right on the scrawled array in his pocket as the two brawling men turned to look at him. Ha, thought Roy, and flipped the switch. 

A moment later, the room was in darkness, illuminated only by the spark zipping out like a firework from the lightswitch over to the men on the adjacent wall. Roy saw them scramble to get out of the way, then the bloom of the fireball he'd aimed at them. He flipped the switch again. The stocky man was sitting stunned on the floor by the crates, red welts already forming on his face and arms. Behind him a crate smouldered gently. The thin man was crouched a couple of metres away, singed but intact, and hissing with anger. Roy could only aim at one of them. Deciding quickly, he flipped the switch again, going for the stocky guy again. A small burst, enough to put him definitively out of the fight, and with any luck to leave a burning flame on his clothes or on the crate which Roy could use to divert a chain of fire on to the thin man. 

The first part of this worked beautifully. The light went out and the spark zipped from it again. The stocky man howled and kicked, batted at a flame on the crate by his shoulder, a bright, easy target in the darkness. Roy touched his fingers to the array, focusing on the air around the flame - and suddenly found himself tackled from the front with some force, sliding along the floor with an opponent on top of him, pinning him down. The thin man? How had he approached so quietly? There was a hand round Roy's right wrist, trying to pull his hand from his pocket. He was going for the array. Roy resisted, screwing himself up to it, but somehow his arm gave way of its own accord. The thin man was prising the paper out of his numbed fingers. Roy heard a couple of quick rips, then the thin man snorted a laugh, and scraps of paper landed on his face. It was unexpected and nasty, being suddenly physically outmatched like this. In normal circumstances, Roy could have got a few good punches in. As it was, he needed to get away fast. He shoved the heel of his right hand out, as hard as he could, felt it connect satisfyingly with his opponent's jaw, and the man's head jerk back. Then he pushed his weight sideways and managed to haul himself out from under the thin man, stagger up and over to the wall, hit the light switch and grope for the door. 

It was locked.

Almost instantly, as if that had somehow been the last straw, a powerful wave of dizziness hit him and he found himself leaning back against the wall, struggling to stay upright. The thin man had gotten to his feet, his face red, pumped with fury. Roy was more than half expecting some kind of hideous chimerical transformation, to see wings or scales or spikes bloom from the man's body. Instead he just gave another one of those snorting laughs, pulled a knife out of his jacket, and stepped forward. 

And that, in short, was how Roy found himself, weaponless, utterly exhausted and with a swimming head, braced against a dirty wall in a disused bunker below a one-horse town, waiting to be struck down by an opponent whom ordinarily he could have dropped in a second. Roy might be still standing and ready to move, but still he knew with a tight certainty how this was going to play out. He would dodge the knife with everything he had, but in this condition he would never be fast enough. And then, in all probability, he would die right here on this patch of concrete, pointlessly and without purpose, while, perhaps only a few dozen yards away, Hawkeye, his men and the Elrics fought on or searched the tunnels for him fruitlessly. This had all been so avoidable - such a stupid mistake, a stupid death. The part of his mind that wasn't bone tired was furious with himself. 

The thin man was still watching Roy. He shifted his posture a little, tensed the arm holding the knife. Roy sucked in a deep breath and hauled himself up the wall a little further. At least he'd prepared for this, he told himself. Even without him, the plan could continue, change could be brought to the country. Hawkeye knew where the papers were kept, knew everything he did. His team were excellent. He'd made the right choice in every one of them. They would carry on what he'd started. He could trust them with this. Roy locked eyes with the thin man, clenched his jaw, and waited. 

Then the wall Roy was facing made a deafening crackling noise, heaved, and rolled itself up into an arch. Roy blinked. The thin man blinked. The cloud of floury plaster-dust around the new arch cleared a little, and the thin man turned and peered into it, but Roy already knew who he was going to see. Fullmetal stood in the doorway he'd made, feet apart, grinning like a lunatic at the thin man and his knife. He slammed his palms together and slowly, dramatically extended a long blade from his automail arm. He bent his knees and dropped into a fighting stance, bringing the blade up. Then he lifted his left hand and made a showy little beckoning motion. Normally Roy would be laughing inwardly - quite possibly outwardly - at the vast entertainment value of Edward's adolescent sense of theatre. Right here and right now, though, he just couldn't muster the laughter. It was pushed out by a rush of relief so powerful that he could feel it through his whole body, so intense that he had to concentrate to keep his knees from buckling.

The thin man had his back turned to Roy now, taking in this new development. His posture was stiff; he seemed somewhat stunned. Very briefly, Roy considered attempting a tackle from behind, but things being as they were, this was so clearly going to end up with him stabbed that it wasn't even an option. Part of him was frustrated, resentful that he wasn't up on his feet, running the show here. The rest of his mind was exhausted and vastly grateful. This fight was going to be over in moments, then all he would have to concentrate on would be salving his dignity as they got back to the others, by staying upright and summoning up a dry remark or two. 

In front of him, the thin man made an odd sound in his throat, hunched forward, and started to stretch. His joints shifted impossibly, reconfiguring themselves. This really was turning out to be a day of surprises, thought Roy. Then - hey! Only now was he choosing to transform. Roy could be taken care of with a hunting knife, but Fullmetal warranted the full effect? Roy knew he couldn't look very impressive right now, but that was just insulting. 

The thin man had clearly completely forgotten about Roy. He and Edward were circling each other now, wary and tense. The chimera's skin had turned rough, grey and scaly, his skull stretched out into a pointed snout, a long, permanent grin showing rows of sharp little teeth. Some kind of lizard? His shoes were kicked off, feet stretched long at the ankles up into an extra leg joint, and he was bobbing on the balls of his feet. 

Roy looked at Edward, trying to work out what had impressed the chimera enough to make him pull out the big guns. There was the showy alchemical entrance, the wall and the blade, yes. But now that he thought of it, Fullmetal himself wasn't looking quite like the scrappy brat he'd grown used to seeing on the other side of his desk. He'd grown a little, but more than that, he'd filled out. Edward's shoulders looked broad and muscular under his thin shirt. His face was longer, the puppy fat had dropped away, his jawline was a little heavier. Huh. When had that happened? When had he shifted from looking like a baby-faced teenager whose opponents underestimated him, to a tough, wiry young man who immediately gave them pause?

And now that he thought about it, it also wasn't like Fullmetal at all to take this long before making his first move. He was used to seeing him charging in propelled by rage and boundless energy, relying on improvisation rather than strategy. It was odd to see him coolly sizing his opponent up like this.

Blindingly fast, the chimera moved, bounding across the room in two rapid leaps, striking for Edward's throat with an open mouth. For a moment, Edward didn't react at all, and Roy's stomach clenched up. Then the chimera was on him and Edward's arms were moving, not up to block his jaws but on his upper arm, moving down and in, using the chimera's own weight to throw him efficiently over Edward's shoulder, crashing to the floor a couple of metres away and sliding over nearly as far as the opposite wall. An elegant, economical move - quite unlike the chaotic, inventive strikes that he thought of as Fullmetal's style. Yet another surprise, then. Roy hadn't seen him in action for a good few months before today, he realised. It seemed his skills were maturing.

Roy's legs had started shaking again, worse this time. Since no-one was looking, he sighed, and let himself slide down the wall until he was in a sitting position. With a fight going on around him, really he ought to be on his feet, ready to move even if he couldn't contribute anything useful to the situation. But all the blood seemed to have left his head, and if Roy wanted to preserve his energy and indeed what remained of his dignity, the floor was the better option. So he sat, leaning his back against the wall, breathing as slow and deep as he could, concentrating on the fight.

His first judgment, that Fullmetal's fighting style had undergone some interesting developments, turned out to be right. He was still mobile, acrobatic, but his moves had become smoother, far less wasteful - elegant, even. He seemed stiller, more watchful. He even shouted a lot less. That was perhaps the most disquieting thing of all, so much so that Roy was cheered and relieved when the lizard man bit his automail calf, and Ed shook his leg and yelled over the chimera's surprised whine, "How d'you like the taste, huh?" It was reassuring to see signs that this graceful, assured young fighter was really Fullmetal rather than some eerie döppelganger.

The lizard-man was tiring now, but his face showed a clenched and desperate energy. Roy recognised the look immediately, a cornered man who knew it, who with nothing to lose could become suddenly deadly in the final moments of the fight. He didn't shout a warning; he could see in Edward's posture and his intent concentration that he didn't need to be told. The chimera sprang at Edward again, a move with fury but no real power in it. Edward threw him back to the floor almost casually. The chimera groaned, rolled over, and turned his eyes on Roy - and suddenly he was in the air, springing for Roy's throat like a striking snake. 

What happened next was so quick and fluid that Roy had to reconstruct it for himself, in the moments afterwards. A wall from nowhere cut the chimera off at the knees as he sprang, the lizard-man stepped backwards to steady himself, and as he did so, his foot behind the wall seemed to drop into a hole, and he went flying backwards to the floor. His head struck the concrete with a resounding crack. The back of Roy's head throbbed briefly in sympathy even as the rest of him glowed with revengeful satisfaction. Another clap and a touch of Ed's hands to the floor, and the new wall flowed back, filling the hole in the floor, as bands of concrete rose up round the lizard man's torso and thighs, holding him in place. He seemed to be beyond even noticing. 

Ed stood up, snorted through his nose, and finally looked at Roy. "Where the fuck are all these idiots coming from? If I was this guy, and Milne tried to drum me into his lame little gang, I'd have bitten his ass off."

Roy snorted. "Quite." His voice sounded odd and scratchy to his own ears, as if he had a sore throat. There was a little pause. 

Ah, well, thought Roy. Let the mockery begin. He supposed letting Fullmetal get a few jibes in was only fair, a polite gesture towards equivalency for saving his life. Roy could wait until he could see straight before he attempted to gain the upper hand.

Edward broke the short silence with a shouted opening salvo: "What the fuck was that about, then?" Roy winced at the volume. The direct approach. 

"Where the hell did you go? We didn't even realise you weren't there until Hawkeye and Al got back! We've all been running round these stupid tunnels like idiots looking for you! And! You've got your skull bashed in! Bet you thought no one could get the jump on you! This, this is what you get for being an arrogant, smug one-trick pony! And," he paused for breath, then moved in for the kill, "Lieutenant Hawkeye is going to go so crazy on your ass, you stupid bastard, and I am going to get  _popcorn_  and  _watch_."

Roy bristled out of reflex, but then thought, woozily, fair enough. He considered his reply, but found himself already talking. 

"I made a mistake. Basic. Stupid of me." Roy felt a mild pang of alarm. He'd meant to put a better spin on the truth before he spoke, but his brain seemed to have mailed the words straight to his mouth without consulting him first. He'd seen soldiers with head injuries come out with some truly bizarre things, in the past. He was going to have to watch himself once they were back with his men.

Another silence. "That was actually rather impressive. You've improved." Roy heard himself speak again. Damn it, damn it. As if being dizzy and helpless wasn't bad enough, he had to have involuntary honesty on top. He really hated head injuries, he decided. Another lesson learnt from today to add to the list, he thought. 

Edward looked at him in response, shocked and sceptical. For a moment he seemed to be looking for an insult concealed somewhere in Roy's words, then he snorted derisively and stepped forward. "You hit your head pretty hard, huh?"

Roy's hand went up to his head. It was sticky at the back, and much of his hair seemed to be stiff with dried blood. He touched his face, and more dried blood flaked off in his hand. He must look an absolute state. Now Edward was stepping towards him, frowning, crouching in front of him. He raised his left hand to the back of Roy's head, and Roy winced in anticipating of his poor cracked skull being mauled about. But his touch on Roy's scalp, moving the matted hair aside, was surprisingly gentle and deft. Edward's other hand, the automail one, cupped Roy's jaw and the base of his skull at the back, supporting his head while Edward looked over the injury. It felt oddly intimate, but it was odder still to see Fullmetal showing no signs of embarrassment at the proximity. How bad must Roy look, to provoke a reaction like this? Still, Edward's movements were competent and careful, so Roy stayed still. His head was angled down, close to Edward's chest and the hollow of his throat. He watched the even breaths, noticed the triangular patch at the front of Edward's shirt which was soaked through with sweat, noticed the contours of muscles that could be traced where the shirt stuck to his skin. He smelled like fresh sweat, and gun oil. It somehow wasn't an unpleasant combination. The coolness of the metal fingers at the back of his neck felt soothing, eased his headache a little.

Then Edward's hands gently tilted Roy's head back to lean against the wall, and moved down to his shoulders. His right hand lifted again, then the palm moved across Roy's forehead, holding his hair away from his eyes. Automatically, Roy leaned his head a little into the cool metal. He found himself fighting off the impulse to close his eyes. Edward was looking intently into his eyes - checking for unequal pupil size or loss of focus, Roy guessed. Competent of him. He must have actually cracked that pamphlet on field medicine Hawkeye had pressed on the brothers. Roy found himself looking back. It was slightly disconcerting, seeing Edward this close. Now his face had grown thinner and longer, the lines of his cheekbones stood out. There was a little rasp of brownish stubble on his jaw. Roy considered a joke - "started shaving at last, I see?" - but found he didn't want to draw attention to their proximity or his study of Edward's face. Edward's eyes were large with concentration, the irises clear, amber. He must have no idea that he was beautiful now, Roy thought. He was so focused on his quest, on his brother, on the path ahead of him, that Roy was willing to bet that he wouldn't even have noticed admiring looks or attempts at flirtation. Which, right now, was an excellent thing for the remnants of Roy's dignity. To his mental list of lessons from today - tell someone where you're going, head injuries are embarrassing, sew a spare glove into the lining of your jacket - he added, Edward Elric. To be reviewed, later, when he had all his faculties back. 

Edward pulled back, his examination done. "How d'you feel? Because you kind of look like you're not all there."

Roy bristled a little, and tried to focus his wandering mind on the moment. "My head hurts. There's some dizziness. A little nausea. My balance is off." Great. He'd intended to play it down, a long-established habit with injury. Damn this concussion for making him honest and straightforward. 

"Think you can stand?"

Roy nodded, and pushed himself up onto his feet. There was a little shakiness, but Edward came in before he was all the way up, hooking one of Roy's arms over his shoulder. Roy straightened his spine, tried not to lean too much, and then took a moment to concentrate on breathing through the head rush and not vomiting. Edward's voice sounded near his ear. "Puke on my pants, Mustang, and you buy me a new pair."

"I'm fine," Roy said huffily. Good. He'd managed a lie. Edward responded with a derisive snort, but they started walking anyway. 

The pace was slow, which was embarrassing but necessary. Roy stared at the patch of ground in front of him as they shuffled along and tried to bully his own body into cooperating with him. Breathe, don't throw up, don't lean, take another step. After a short time, the nausea was receding and Roy was starting to feel a little more fully present. As his head cleared, he became steadily more aware of the feel of Edward's shoulders and neck under his arm, the muscles tensed from supporting him, the ridges of the automail port under his shoulder, shifting smoothly. Roy's legs seemed to be tiring quickly. He tensed his muscles, tried to take firm steps, to keep the occasional shaking from being noticeable. 

"You're going to the hospital, you know," said Edward, conversationally but with a hint of malice. Then, he added, rubbing it in: "And if you want to argue, you can have it out with Hawkeye." 

In the absence of a comeback, Roy just nodded. They walked along in silence for a little while. Roy noticed he'd started leaning on Edward more. His legs weren't improving. But Edward didn't seem to be having any problems supporting his weight. Really, this could have gone worse, Roy thought. At least he was on his feet, at least he hadn't fainted into Fullmetal's arms. That would take some living down. 

Edward's head turned to look at him. Roy kept his eyes fixed on the tunnel ahead, pretending he hadn't noticed. He felt Edward's grip on his wrist pull a little harder, his automail arm tighten a bit around Roy's back. What? Roy thought. Then patches of static were floating in across his vision, and his ears were ringing. Ah, he thought in resignation, of course, and then fainted.


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

>   _Who the hell put on fancy cologne to go chase thugs down a bunch of damp tunnels?_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Contains action, peril, mockery, cheap jokes and unresolved sexual tension. 

If it hadn't been for that idiot Mustang, they could have been out of there in five minutes.

As he watched Hawkeye and two of the men disappear down the narrow tunnels, Ed had felt his chest tighten in reflexive worry. He knew how tough Al was, knew he was an awesome fighter - but still, the knowledge that his little brother was somewhere else, in danger, without him made Ed twitchy and anxious. But it seemed like only a moment before he heard percussive clanking and the tap of human footsteps. He smiled but didn't turn round. He was still concentrating on trying to finish his fight with a snake chimera. The snake-guy wasn't tough but he was freaking impossible to pin down. Ed had been chasing him around the room for what seemed like most of the time since Mustang's team had got there. It was like that time when he was nine when Winry's pet mouse had escaped and the three of them had spent three fucking hours running around the living room trying to catch it while it pinged behind bookcases and under sofas, probably laughing its little white ass off.

"We got them, brother!" Al's voice sounded cheerfully from somewhere behind him. Ed waved a hand in greeting, but kept his eyes on his opponent. Snake-guy was wedged in the twelve-inch gap between the top of a supply cupboard and the ceiling, looking as smug as that mouse had under Granny Pinako's armchair. Ed considered. If he tipped the cupboard over, he'd be off like a shot. He thought about transmuting the door upwards into a sheet to trap the guy in place, but the last time he'd tried that, with the pipes on the ceiling, the snake-man had been too quick. Worth a shot, though. Edward eyeballed the chimera, waiting for the right moment to clap, and - the top of the cupboard suddenly dropped downwards, wove itself into mesh, closed round the chimera. A chainmail bag full of snake-guy hit the floor with a solid smack. Ed turned, following the trail of dissipating alchemical light back to his little brother, crouching with his gauntlets pressed to the concrete floor. His posture looked sheepish.

"Hey!" Ed yelled. This wasn't fair! He'd really, really been looking forward to his final, devastating triumph over the snake-man. He'd had his taunts worked out already! "What was that for? I was just about to get the guy! He was right there!" He waved his arms over his head, as if gesturing to an invisible referee. That was not okay. Since Al had started transmuting without arrays, he was developing a worrying habit of one-upping Ed's transmutations.

Al got to his feet and dipped his head. "But, Brother, he was distracted! He was concentrating on you, so I just took advantage! I was just trying to help wrap this thing up." His tone lifted a few notes to the reassuring, sincere pitch he used with stray animals, and when he was trying to talk his way out of something. "I'm sure you would have had him really soon if I hadn't come in." No one but Ed ever seemed to catch on to how sneaky his little brother could be. Now that he remembered, Al had caught the mouse too.

"Where's the Colonel?" Hawkeye's voice was a command, addressing the whole room. Ed looked around. Huh. She was right. No Mustang. Ed hadn't noticed him for a while - he'd been too intent on his own chase. Wait, were all Milne's guys still in the room? Ed counted the bodies on the ground - four. Had there been four before, or five? Then he remembered. "Shit, wait, where did the hairy guy get to?"

Around him, the army guys all looked annoyingly blank. "You know, he was tall, uh" - Ed pulled at his nose and bunched his shoulders out, trying to do an impression - "and with a red shirt? Come on, he was right there?"

Hawkeye held her hand up. "So, one of the criminals you were fighting is definitely missing?"

"Yep."

Hawkeye glared around the men. They all shifted sharply to attention as she did so, including one Ed had been sure outranked her. "None of you saw the Colonel fall or leave? Despite the fact that it was your duty to be guarding his back?" She paused and turned to look piercingly at each of them in turn. "I have all of your names, and when we have ascertained the Colonel's safety you can be sure that I will be passing this failure on him." There was some discreet quailing. Ed felt a pang of sympathy for the poor saps. After all, it was hardly their fault if the Colonel had run off like an idiot after that hairy guy, or got himself shot and dragged off, or ... Edward's thoughts trailed off. Hawkeye was staring at him now. She looked stern and disappointed. Not for the first time, Ed was vaguely reminded of Granny Pinako. Ed turned his head to one side. This was hardly his fault! Was it? Had the Colonel really been struck down in front of him while he didn't notice? He was probably still just chasing that guy down the tunnels lighting fires up his ass, right? The Colonel couldn't really be lying dead or bleeding out somewhere, just because Ed had been concentrating on getting one over on that stupid snake-guy?

Damn it. Ed ran over to the corner where, at the start of the fight, he'd shed his jacket on the floor. As he pulled out a piece of paper, Hawkeye and Al were already striding over to look. Ed unfolded the map. "Look, here's where we are. There are basically three ways the Colonel could have gone - down this way, to the rooms they were operating out of, or left here, this is the stores, or here - that corridor goes to the other exit. Don't worry, it's blocked off by a rockfall."

Al pulled some blank paper from his loincloth - God, wasn't there anywhere less disturbing he could keep stuff? - clapped, and touched it. There was a slight burning smell, and the lines of the map appeared on the two blank sheets. Al waved his gauntlet over the paper to cool it.

Hawkeye nodded and took one of the maps. "We'll split up, then. Jenkins and Vittorio, with me. Muller and Captain James, if you'd go with Alphonse. And - " She sighed. Edward, anticipating her, was already off and running down one of the corridors, tucking the map into his back pocket. "Edward!" she yelled after him. "Please try not to die!"

As if. Ed was glad he had at least got away without an unnecessary escort of military idiots who were just going to get in the way. The Colonel was probably fine. Why did Ed roll over so easily when people made him feel guilty about stuff? And how did Roy Mustang always do the exact thing that would turn his day into a pain in the ass? If it hadn't been for him, Ed would be already done with this crap. He was absolutely starving, he'd missed lunch and fighting always made him hungry anyway, he was bored rigid, and this had been another side trip that had got them absolutely no steps further to getting Al's body back. This Milne guy and his stupid chimera mercenary business, what a bunch of idiots. All Ed wanted was to have the whole pointless bullshit assignment thing wrapped up, and get out of the tunnels and back to town, and buy one or possibly three of those awesome-looking cheese things from that food stand on the main square, and sit down with Al and talk about where they were headed next. Was that too much to ask? Huh?

Ed ran down the narrow tunnels, wrenching doors open as he passed. He passed a left turn, kept going, and found himself passing through an open doorway into a damp, empty room with stacks of chairs along the opposite wall. He peered through them for a moment: no visible exits. Ed dug the map out of his back pocket, looked at it for a moment and stuffed it back in. The store-room was straight back down the turning he'd passed before. Ed stuffed the map back and set off again. A few metres beyond the turn, the light bulbs were blown and the corridor ahead faded into darkness. Ed stopped and thought for a moment. He wasn't keen to go on without some kind of light source. Besides the danger of falling on his face, this place might still not be completely deserted. And he hadn't brought a torch. Crap.

Ed thought for a moment, then clapped and pressed his hands to the floor, calling up sand and lime from the concrete of the floor a few feet in front of him, piling them in the small hollow his transmutation had created. He clapped again and concentrated. He hadn't done this one for a while, but it came back to him easily. The lime and silica bubbled and fizzed together, then within a few seconds rose up to take the form of a glass jar, from which steam curled up slowly. Ed took a few steps forward, peered suspiciously into the darkness, then quickly unzipped himself and peed into the jar. He'd kind of been needing to do that anyway. Then he zipped back up, clapped his hands and touched the floor again. The urine boiled away rapidly in the jar as Ed isolated the phosphor from it and tried really hard not to breathe through his nose. A few drops of water to oxygenate the phosphor, and it glowed like a firefly. For the finishing touch, Ed pulled a little aluminium from the concrete and dropped a crude lid on top of the jar. Then he picked up his gross, awesome new makeshift lantern, careful to use his automail hand, and started walking again. The corridor smelled kind of awful now, but that was science for you.

After a short distance, the corridor seemed to end at a door with a thin crack of light under it. He'd reached the stores. Ed made out a light switch on the wall adjacent. Sizing up his options, he left his glass jar where it was, jogged up and hit the switch. If he was going to find anyone now, they would probably be in here, and if he had to make a quick getaway, it was better he had both hands free. Ed reached for the door handle, then paused for a moment. Under the door, the light flashed off. Then he heard a crackling whoosh, a crash, swearing. Looked like he'd found the Colonel.

Ed turned the door-handle, jiggling it for good measure but the door didn't give. Locked from the inside. He stepped back to give it a good kick, then reconsidered. The light was back on now. If whoever it was on the other side had seen the door handle turning, they could be waiting. Ed looked around him, and noticed a thin corridor he remembered from the map. It ran most of the way round the main store-room, with small file rooms and supply cupboards dotted round the outside wall. Grinning to himself, Ed jogged around the corner. With any luck, he'd arrive just in time to steal Mustang's victory from under his nose. Ha. This was going to rock.

***

Ten minutes later, Ed was trudging back down the corridor with Mustang draped over him, leaning uncomfortably on his shoulder. The sheer, crowing high of bailing Mustang out was being rapidly being displaced by the annoying consequences: Ed now had the responsibility of hauling his commanding officer's ass out of the tunnels. Still, at least Mustang was on his feet. Back in the storeroom, the Colonel hadn't looked like he was going to be walking anywhere much. By the end of Ed's short scuffle with the chimera, Mustang had been sat leaning back against the wall, even pastier than usual, with a dried streak of blood down the side of his face and a weird, placid, unfocussed look in his eyes. He'd barely even seemed to react when the chimera had sprung at him, just looked at it as if he wasn't quite sure what it was.

When Ed had looked over Mustang properly, he'd been almost as alarmed by the man's uncharacteristic pliability as he had been by the long, nasty tear on the crown of his head. Apparently, someone had smashed something with hard edges into his skull, not quite enough to kill him, but enough to render him loopy with concussion and unsteady on his feet enough to have to use Ed as a human crutch. Ed's automail port and his left bicep were both aching already from lugging far too much of Mustang's weight at an awkward angle. Ed could smell the man's cologne. It smelled expensive. Who the hell put on fancy cologne to go chase thugs down a bunch of damp tunnels?

Abruptly, Ed felt Mustang's weight increase, as if he was sagging against him. Great. He took a glance at the Colonel. Mustang was still walking forwards, but he was staring ahead, his eyes unfocussed and vague. Shit, he really was going to pass out. Ed tightened his hold and opened his mouth to tell Mustang in no uncertain terms that he was not allowed to faint. But before he could say anything the Colonel had slumped in his arms, a dead weight, legs trailing on the floor, and Ed was staggering, legs braced, trying not to tip them both ass backwards on the ground.

He took a good lungful of air and yelled. "Hey!" He shook the Colonel. Mustang didn't respond. His head lolled forwards, hair in his eyes. Ed shifted his weight more onto his automail leg. "Hey! Don't do that! Mustang! Hey! Wake up, idiot! You think I'm going to carry you?" Still nothing. He tried another shake, a little gentler. Nothing. Ed felt his stomach curl up a little.

Carefully and awkwardly, he dropped to a crouch. Mustang's body sagged onto its knees. He manoeuvred the Colonel's head onto his lap, and then stretched his own legs out one at a time to sit down properly. Ed took a good look at Mustang, and felt that clench of worry in his stomach increase. Mustang was lying face-up now in Ed's arms, with his knees bent awkwardly to one side, arms flopping loosely at his sides, palm-up. The posture looked so wrong on him. Mustang was always in control, always posing - even semi-conscious and about to be gutted by a chimera. The man looked dead. Ed took a moment to notice the reassuring rise and fall of the Colonel's chest, and to feel the pulse beating in his neck. He was just fucking passed out, for God's sake. He was a lazy bastard and Ed needed to stop worrying.

But it was easier said than done. He took a look at Mustang's face, trying to remember if there were other things he should check. The man's face was the only part of him that still somehow looked composed. With the muscles of his face relaxed and expressionless, he looked serene and misleadingly noble, as if he was carved out of something. There was something a little scary about that, but Ed couldn't be bothered to pin it down. However, he totally wouldn't put it past the man to practice looking good in his sleep. Ed patted Mustang's cheek, hard enough to be more of a light slap. The Colonel's eyes flickered open, and suddenly he was back to looking concussed and goofy.

"Edward. Hello." Mustang looked at him, almost cross-eyed. One smart remark about being in Ed's lap, and Ed was going to drop his head right on the floor, cracked skull and all. Instead, the Colonel just frowned for a moment. "We're still in the tunnels."

"Uh, yeah."

"Did I pass out?" Mustang sounded vaguely, drunkenly horrified.

"Oh, yeah," said Edward with some relish. The Colonel frowned again, then gave Ed another of those wonky looks. "Fullmetal? I'm not entirely sure I can walk."

"Yeah, yeah. I know, I'm gonna have to carry you. Okay - but you should know you owe me over this, Mustang." Ed flashed his best shit-eating grin. "And I will collect."

Mustang frowned, then suddenly seemed to gather himself and come back to life a little. "It'll be entertaining to see you try. I'd imagine - it'd look like rather like an ant carrying a breadcrumb four times its size." The Colonel managed a twitchy smirk. He looked transparently smug to have regained the advantage.

This was Edward's cue, he guessed, to take the bait and lose his shit, to jump up, point a finger, swear insults - but somehow it wasn't happening this time. There was something about this situation that made him feel off-balance and weird. So he found himself breaking eye contact instead and looking ahead down the corridor, trying to remember how far it had been, how long he was going to have to drag Mustang before he could hand him off to Al or a couple of those guys or somebody who gave a fuck.

He felt the weight of Mustang's head shift a bit in his lap, and glanced down. Crap. The Colonel was completely passed out again now, head leaning sideways into Ed's thigh, a blank little slit of white showing under his eyelids. Actually, he kind of didn't look so good. Still, he was breathing evenly. Ed sighed and carefully rolled Mustang off his lap so that he was face-down, trying not to hit the ungrateful bastard's head on the floor as he did so. Edward crouched, hooked his arms under the Colonel's shoulders, and straightened his legs, dragging Mustang up to sag against him a kneeling position. He reached down, grabbed Mustang's left wrist, and hoisted the man's arm up over his automail shoulder. Then he squatted down again, hooked his right arm round Mustang's legs from the back, and straightened, heaving him into a fireman's lift. Huh. That had gone okay. Ed shifted Mustang's weight on his shoulders a bit, hearing a vague gasp as he did so. The Colonel didn't weigh as much as Ed had thought. Ed took a few uneven steps forward, letting his automail leg take more of their combined weight. It seemed to work. Eh, maybe this wasn't going to take so long after all.

A few metres back past the left turn, and Ed staggered, nearly losing his footing. He'd changed his mind: the Colonel weighed a fucking ton, and this was going to take forever. Ed wedged himself awkwardly between Mustang and the wall of the tunnel, propping him up enough that Ed could get one hand free to dig out the map and consult it. He looked it over for a second, then pocketed it, bringing his left hand round Mustang's body to meet his automail hand, which was still holding the Colonel up over his shoulder. He couldn't quite reach from that angle, so he hugged Mustang a bit closer, and managed to tap his fingers together, calling up the formula. Then he felt a little rush of heat in his cheeks, followed by annoyance and a vague desire to flee, and he loosened his grip a little. Ed tapped his left hand to the wall, and let the energy ripple off through the concrete on the paths he'd set. A moment later, a speaker and a large radio microphone popped from the wall at his eye level. It had an embossed logo reading "Elric F.M." Cool, thought Ed. He'd have to use that one again, when there were people in the same room who could appreciate it properly.

Ed leaned forward and spoke. "Hey Al, Hawkeye. I got him!" A moment later, Hawkeye's and Al's voices came from the speakers at the same time, accompanied by a whine of feedback. Then Al fell politely silent and Hawkeye spoke.

"What's the Colonel's condition, over?"

"Uh, he's okay but he can't talk, he's passed out. I think he's concussed or something. Someone hit his head. Oh yeah, Al, can you come and meet me? The bastard's heavy."

"On my way, brother!" He heard Al's clanking run fade out, and a sigh he thought must be Hawkeye.

"Agreed," she said. "We'll rendezvous with you on your way back to the junction. Please notify us if the Colonel's condition changes. Over and out." He heard her bark a quick order in the background, then more running footsteps. Ed sighed, hefted Mustang over his shoulder, took a moment to get his balance, and started walking again.  
 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Historical geekery concerning Ed’s slightly crass DIY lantern. While I was researching this fic, looking for a way for Ed to make his own phosphorescent light source, I stumbled on the fact that in the real world, the glowing properties of phosphorus mixed with oxygen were discovered - honestly! - by a seventeenth-century alchemist who was distilling his own wee to try to make the Philosopher's Stone. How could I turn that down? I did consider whether Ed would do that, but, well, yeah, he would. Enjoy the smelly historical details [at our friend Wikipedia](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phosphorus#History_and_discovery) if you're curious.


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> On the battlefield, others saw the Colonel as a courageous and inspiring leader and a devastating human weapon; she saw the sixteen-year old boy who had once fallen off her father's roof trying to show her he could stand up without a handhold. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Contains action, peril, mockery, cheap jokes and unresolved sexual tension. 

Hawkeye was surrounded by idiots.

As she jogged through the tunnels, torch in her left hand and revolver in her right, she found herself mentally reviewing the roster of untrustworthy disgraces she'd picked that morning. After Edward's phone call, the Colonel had taken a quick decision. Given the apparent strength of the enemy, the paramilitary nature of their activities, and the strong possibility that they were led by a disgraced former State Alchemist, Gregor Milne, it would be appropriate to contain the threat with military force. There was also the unspoken fact that the Colonel, quite rightly, did not trust the military police. From the perspective of their private goals, it would be preferable that Mustang's command dealt with the matter directly first. They could pass any information and prisoners over to the military authorities later, after what was necessary had been done.

Of course, there was also the fact that the Colonel couldn't stand Milne. Hawkeye herself had never met the man, but she was always content to dislike before the fact any alchemist who made chimerae. It saved time.

There had been no need to empty the office; and so Hawkeye had found herself quickly picking out a small team of enlisted men to accompany herself and Mustang. Hawkeye habitually maintained a list in her files of enlisted men with a proven record of competency and courage, for occasions such as these. After all this was over, she was going to be striking some names off that list.

She had only left the Colonel with his men and Edward for four and a half minutes. Alphonse, as everyone but Edward must have realised, barely needed her help to finish the fight. He'd nevertheless thanked her very nicely for turning up. She liked Alphonse.

Then they had got back to the junction to find Mustang missing, and five soldiers and Edward entirely unaware of the fact. One of the troopers, Private Livingston, was sitting against the wall, shot in the arm. Hawkeye would show him some leniency. A second, Captain James, was currently applying a pressure bandage to the first man's wound. He had failed either to observe or to prioritise; his attention to his comrade wasn't going to get him out of this, and the fact that he was technically the second in command here worsened the offence. The third and fourth, Warrant Officers Zavoysky and Muller, were currently in a frankly unnecessary two-to-one fight with one of the mercenaries. Hawkeye dropped the mercenary with a single shot to the knee. The men jumped. So they should. The fifth trooper, Private Woods, was standing turned away from them at the entrance to one of the tunnels. His posture and cocked gun suggested he was keeping look-out, yet he was clearly surreptitiously lighting a cigarette. Woods' wisest option right now would probably be to drop his smokes and run straight down that tunnel.

Meanwhile, Edward had his complete attention focused on restraining a foe who clearly posed no threat. Hawkeye felt somewhat more inclined to be lenient with Edward. He did have a more solid excuse than the others for behaving like an adolescent boy. Of course, that was precisely the trouble with Edward. He spent most of his life squaring up to the responsibilities of a man; and then, just as Hawkeye began to take this for granted and trust him to behave as an adult, if not as a soldier, he would do something that reminded her that he was, like all teenage boys, thoroughly idiotic. Alphonse, as usual showing himself the exception that proved the rule, quickly restrained Edward's opponent.

The enemy having been subdued, and guilty parties noted, Hawkeye moved in to deal with their remaining problem. She cleared her throat and called out. "Where is the Colonel?" Six faces turned to stare at her blankly. Woods attempted to discreetly drop his lit cigarette behind his back. It hit his shin on the way down.

***

With her stomach clenched into a tense ball of anger and worry, Hawkeye ran down a straight, doorless corridor towards the large room that had served as Milne's headquarters. In order not to be mastered by the worry, Hawkeye was working on distracting herself with the anger.

The Colonel himself, she decided, had clearly done something stupid enough that a reprimand would be appropriate. Hawkeye had little doubt about what had happened; the Colonel must have split from the group to pursue a retreating enemy. She had guarded the man for years, and knew that, in the middle of a fight, high on adrenaline, cortisol and most of all his own power, he was occasionally prone to dropping his guard. It was a bad habit which he knew of, but never seemed to be able to shake. Privately, Hawkeye worried that this might be because she was too good at her job; that her protection of his back now sometimes extended to his relying on her to bail him out of dangerous foolishness. On the battlefield, others saw the Colonel as a courageous and inspiring leader and a devastating human weapon; she saw the sixteen-year old boy who had once fallen off her father's roof trying to show her he could stand up without a handhold.

As they neared the door, Hawkeye motioned for her men to stay still, and popped her torch into her jacket. She'd judged that the Colonel's most likely location was the headquarters, and so she'd taken the two soldiers who'd accompanied her to go to Alphonse, the only two whose competence she could still trust and whose noses she had no desire to break. She stepped forwards on the balls of her feet, her gun cocked. Bangs, rattles and the sound of conversation echoed from within the room. Alphonse had told her that Milne and most of his men were securely held here. She guessed that the escaping mercenary had been intending to free them. It should have been no trouble for Colonel Mustang to incapacitate him before he did so, unless - well.

Hawkeye made eye contact with Vittorio and Jenkins, and showed them her left hand, the first three fingers held up. Silently, she counted them down from three, then she bent her knees, put her left hand to the doorknob and her shoulder to the door, and pushed up hard. As the door flew open she dived through it, at the same time drawing and cocking a second revolver with her left hand, wheeling round to get a good survey of the room, and landing in a crouch.

In the centre of the empty, high-ceilinged room was the concrete pen Edward had transmuted, and from it was coming a torrent of applause. The clapping hands and surprisingly cheerful faces of the captured mercenaries peered out from a series of narrow holes at eye level, like the windows of a sheep truck. There were a few whistles and cheers mixed in with the applause, and a single shouted comment Hawkeye didn't quite catch. She looked at the captive men, automatically bringing her guns up in their direction as she did so. They fell instantly very silent.

Edward wouldn't have been so inattentive as to cage these men but leave them armed. Dismissing them as a threat, Hawkeye made a half circuit around the cage, motioning her men to do so from the other side. The room was undoubtedly empty, but one should always be thorough. At the end of the room, she saw a bloody, blackened sprawl and a large patch of charred concrete. Milne. Alphonse had filled her in on that part of events too. She didn't feel particularly sorry for him. And it was certainly going to be quicker now to wrap up the paperwork.

Vittorio called out from the other side of the pen. "The room's clear, ma'am!"

"We're moving out. Follow me!" With Vittorio and Jenkins at her heels, Hawkeye jogged back out. Although she told herself it was no more likely now than before that the Colonel was injured, the worry was rising back up. Her fingers itched. As she ran, she heard an echoing shout from one of the men from the cage. "Marry me!"

***

Hawkeye was halfway back to the junction when Edward's speaker and radio mike popped out of the wall. Edward had put a little logo on the microphone. Cute. She raised an eyebrow. Jenkins and Vittorio gawped. Hawkeye made a mental note of the gawking. While she would still recommend these two for future assignments, they would definitely need a reminder to keep their heads when faced with the unexpected.

When Edward told her he'd got the Colonel, he delivered the news with cheerful finality, as if this meant problem solved. She couldn't share his relief yet. Edward's news could turn out either to be good or bad. Unconsciousness and a head wound probably meant a concussion, but there were also worse possibilities. In Ishbal, Hawkeye had once seen a fellow soldier with a head injury walk away from the battlefield joking and complaining, only to drop dead an hour later, felled by a bleed in the brain. Ed didn't seem to realise how serious matters might be (had he read that field medicine pamphlet? At least Alphonse would have) and she didn't enlighten him. He didn't have enough knowledge to do much with the information, so the best thing she could do was to get to the Colonel as quickly as possible, and assess the situation from there.

Hawkeye signed off briskly, and set off again at a run.

After a thirty second sprint down the tunnel from the junction, she spotted them. Edward was trudging ahead, carrying the Colonel over his shoulders in a fairly competent fireman's lift. He really shouldn't be doing that. If the Colonel had a neck injury, he could be worsening it. Mustang's head was down and Hawkeye could see blood in his hair. Entirely against her will, her stomach rolled. She sped up. Coming to a stop by Edward's side, she saw that Jenkins and Vittorio had kept pace with her. She nodded at them, and without further instructions they carefully took the Colonel's weight up and helped Ed lower him to the ground. She noticed Vittorio holding Mustang's head gently in one hand as they moved.

She kneeled beside the Colonel and took a good look while Edward babbled his report. The blow had been to the back of the skull. It had been with something sharp enough to break the skin - that cut would need a couple of stitches - but there was no perceptible indentation below the wound. That was a good sign. The Colonel's lack of responsiveness was not. She couldn't rouse him by shouting his name or by squeezing his hand. So she popped open the top three buttons of his jacket, made a fist and ground her knuckles into the skin above his sternum, hard.

Mustang's eyes shot open. He looked at her, confused, and almost petulantly, said "Stop that. It hurts." For a moment, she saw him at sixteen, sprawled on the remains of her father's herb garden and clutching his arm.

He looked up at her glassily. She leaned forward and tutted at him, not unkindly, then brushed his fringe back and looked at his eyes. His irises were so dark it was difficult to be sure, but his pupils seemed very dilated. She turned to Edward. He was sitting back on his heels about a yard away, taking it all in. She motioned him over. "When you examined the Colonel initially, did you look at his eyes?"

"Do you mean like checking his pupils to see how dilated they were?" Edward crouched by her, seeming momentarily embarrassed. "Yeah, they were. I think the left one was kind of bigger." That was bad. Hawkeye felt her chest constrict a little. Well, at least Edward had read that pamphlet. "Doesn't that mean he's concussed?" But apparently, not that thoroughly.

"No, Edward, it doesn't mean that." This came from the Colonel. He was frowning, and suddenly seemed more alert.

"It means that it would be best for us to move the Colonel to hospital quickly." Hawkeye chimed in. "It could be the sign of a more dangerous injury." She didn't mince her words in front of the Colonel; he knew at least as much about field medicine as she did, and moreover he wouldn't want her to.

Edward cocked his head, thinking it over. Then, with a quick movement, he leaned over Mustang, examining his eyes intently. Edward was frowning in concentration, as if he was trying to make out bad handwriting. His shoulders were rigid, his arms held defensively across his chest as he tried to make the examination without touching any part of the Colonel’s body with any part of his. The awkward posture left him rocking slightly on the balls of his feet, so that he seemed in danger of toppling forwards. Hawkeye attempted to stop the corners of her mouth from twitching.

The Colonel looked back. His expression was an attempt at his usual impassive wall-face, but he wasn't quite on form, and besides, Hawkeye had learnt to read the wall-face a long time ago. Right now, she could see concern, confusion, and a generous pinch of panic. I don't like the way this afternoon is going, his expression was saying.

Then, from down the corridor came running feet, and a familiar metallic clatter. Edward's head whipped round so fast that his braid hit his cheek. The Colonel blinked, and then turned to look too. Edward wobbled, put a hand out into thin air to steady himself, and then toppled forwards straight onto Mustang's chest.

Alphonse clattered to a halt. His head was canted slightly to one side. He said, brightly but a slight squeak to his voice, "Hello!"

Ed sprang off Mustang and and onto his feet several yards away, so fast he was a blur. “What the fuck!” he yelled, pointing wildly, accusingly at Al. “You made me fall over! You made a ton of noise and you startled me and I fell and it was totally your fault that I fell! Don’t do that! I was – I was –“

“Brother – that’s not fair, I can’t help it! You know I always make a noise when I walk! And how come you didn’t notice me? What were you doing that -“

“I was checking his eyes! For the pupil thing, the thing, the concussion thing. That was in the first aid pamphlet?” Then, inspired: “Lieutenant Hawkeye told me to do it!”

“All right,” said Alphonse, in a mild, unruffled tone that suggested he was saving this one up for later. Hawkeye knew that tone; she’d used it often enough herself on the Colonel.

“What?” howled Edward. “What are you implying? You traitor, that’s a complete lie! You don’t know what you’re talking about!” Whatever it was that Alphonse was planning to tease him about later, Edward had obviously already worked it out. Not for the first time, Hawkeye was a little glad to be an only child.

Mustang, meanwhile, was staring, open-mouthed and frowning, at the whole bizarre exchange. A good deal of colour seemed to have come back into his cheeks. If this hadn’t been an emergency, she would have taken the opportunity to tease him about it a little. As it was, she decided to save this one up for later.

She interrupted. “Edward, Alphonse. We’ll need a stretcher of some kind to transport the Colonel, please.” Mustang tried to mutter a protest but she carried right on over him. “Some kind of rigid material like wood would be ideal, to prevent unnecessary movement of the neck.”

“There was a door back there!” Ed jerked a thumb back towards the junction, speaking far too loudly. “I’ll just go now and use that! Back right away!” And he was down the tunnel making his escape already.

Alphonse said, “I’ll make some ties. I’ll need a jacket or something from one of you guys.” _You can have Woods’ pants_ , Hawkeye was tempted to say. Instead she just unhooked her cavalry skirt and tossed it to Alphonse. He caught it, and clapped.

***

Two hours later, Hawkeye popped her head outside of the door of Mustang’s room and was pleased to find that Edward and Alphonse hadn’t fled. They were sitting side by side on small wooden chairs in a corridor of the town’s small hospital, staring quietly at the opposite wall, on which hung a yellowing painting of a cottage with some fat, jolly peasants on the steps and a curling piece of paper saying “Please Wash Your Hands.”

Mustang was inside the room, sitting up on the bed in his shirt-sleeves. He was looking decidedly less drunk now and more like himself. Another heartening sign: he was being bad-tempered. On the other hand, it seemed that that the doctors shared Hawkeye’s suspicion that this might be something worse than a simple concussion. They were awaiting the results of x-rays which would determine if he had a fracture and possibly a collection of blood between his skull and the membrane around his brain. The latter was apparently likely, and it would mean some unpleasant-sounding emergency brain surgery.

The Colonel had harboured some unrealistic hopes that he was going to be spending that evening in the restaurant carriage of a train to Central, rather than having a hole drilled in his head by a rural brain surgeon. He was dealing with the wait by griping endlessly about the fact that he wasn’t allowed a glass of water. Hawkeye didn’t have anything against helping him distract himself - and, to a degree, her - from worry. However, after half an hour of it, she’d decided to call in reinforcements. At least the Colonel’s rank had secured him a private room while they waited. Hawkeye didn’t like to think what both their moods might have been like if they’d had to stick it out in the main bays. There they’d been sandwiched between a garrulous local drunk who’d fallen off a wall, a fractious child who was crying his way through a tetanus shot, and the child’s angry mother, who was bullying the nervous intern wielding the syringe for making her son cry.

"You can bring your chairs into the room and sit with us, if you'd like." Hawkeye tried to make it sound like a kind gesture.

Edward opened his mouth, but then paused for a moment, rubbing the back of his neck. Hawkeye guessed he'd been about to say that no thanks, they were good, but that part of his brain, the usually dormant part consisting of sensible things his mother had drilled into him, was giving a good metaphorical kick in the shin. Impending maturity? Hawkeye hoped so. It would certainly save Alphonse some work. 

Alphonse stood, picking up his chair and thereby committing his older brother to action. “Thank you, Lieutenant. How’s the Colonel?”

“He’s still awake. We’re still waiting for some x-ray results, but I’m afraid it’s likely they may need to operate.”

They sloped into the room with their chairs and sat down by the end of the bed. Ed looked at the Colonel. The Colonel looked at Ed. Then Mustang looked down and started inspecting the cannula in his hand very closely, and Ed looked to one side and started reading the fire evacuation procedures on the wall with great interest. They were both wearing matching looks of frowning innocent concentration. Hawkeye and Al looked at each other for a moment. Then Al made a tiny choking noise, and Hawkeye found the corners of her mouth twitching up irrepressibly, and so they both settled for looking out of the window instead until they could trust themselves not to laugh.

The door opened and a doctor they hadn’t seen before, a middle-aged woman, marched briskly through without knocking. She glanced round the four of them, giving the room in general a cheerful smile. If she was surprised that one of them was seven feet tall and wearing a suit of armour, she hid it well. Hawkeye supposed that even in a small hospital like this, casualty department doctors were used to a life of surprises.

"Good afternoon, Colonel," she said, spreading a series of x-rays on the bed. "Some good news for you. According to these" - she gestured at the x-rays - "Your skull and its contents is in showroom condition. No fracture, no hematoma – just a nasty concussion.” Hawkeye found herself slowly letting out a breath. “We'll keep you in for observation until tomorrow, and if there's no change, you can go back to Central and enjoy your concussion at home. Rest up, no reading or writing for a week" - the Colonel gave Hawkeye a cheerful glance - "and no alcohol for two weeks." Hawkeye gave the Colonel a cheerful glance of her own and he looked sourly back at her. "Since we're not operating, it's all right for you to eat or drink if you don't feel too sick." The Colonel and Hawkeye exchanged a glance now of mutual lack of cheer. Neither of them were fond of hospital food. Hawkeye thought that later on, she would go back to that place they'd had lunch to see if she could procure some take-out for them both, and perhaps a cold glass of beer while she waited for it. She was still in uniform, but it had been that kind of day.

The doctor retrieved her x-rays and moved on. The door clicked shut, and there followed a slightly awkward pause. It was, predictably, broken by the scrape of Ed’s chair. He stood up, and started heading for the door, looking straight ahead of him and talking as he walked. “Well, I’m starved. I missed lunch dealing with your chimera crap so now it looks like your brain isn’t broken, I’m going to go eat, and then Al and I have to go catch the night train out West, and then I guess we’ll send you a report in a couple weeks. Maybe.” He opened the door and, with his back to them, raised a hand in farewell. “See ya, Colonel. Try not to break it again while I’m gone.”

Alphonse lingered in the room for a second, his gait slightly stiff, shoulders hunching down in mild embarrassment. “Um, ” said Alphonse, buying himself thinking time. “Colonel? I really hope you feel better soon. Goodbye, Lieutenant Hawkeye.” The sentence sped up as he got it out, and on the last words he bolted out the door too.

Finally, the First Lieutenant and her Colonel were alone in the room. For a time, there was a comfortable silence.

Hawkeye sighed, half-consciously. She considered the afternoon it had been, and the many, many things she wanted to say to her commanding officer. Finally, she gave him a sidelong look and said, impassive and straight-faced, "Look, Ma, no hands."

Mustang lifted an eyebrow, presumably attempting to take the direct hit with some style. "Lieutenant?” he said. “Sometimes I'm not entirely sure that I like you."

***

Ed sat next to Al on the edge of the main square's fountain, with his feet propped up on his suitcase and his mouth wrapped around his fourth cheese pastry. These things tasted all right. He would definitely buy them again if he saw some.

He looked out across the square, at the tall windows of the houses opposite, with the late sun reflecting in them, and washing fluttering from rails on the sills. He could still smell the Colonel's stupid cologne. It must have rubbed off on his shirt. God, it was worse than Havoc's stinking cigarettes. He was going to have to have this shirt boiled, no, fumigated, and then he was going to send Mustang's office the bill. Suddenly and vividly, the moment returned to him when he had crouched on the tunnel floor with Mustang a warm, heavy dead weight in his arms, and he felt a vague press of relief that it had all turned out okay. 

"Brother? What are you thinking about?"

Ed started slightly and turned to Al. "When we get your body back, I'm going to write a pamphlet on street food. Top ten greasy snacks of Amestris, ranked in order, and the best places to get 'em. You can help me with the research."

Somewhere behind them, a horse's hooves clopped slowly on the cobbles and cartwheels rattled. Their shadows were long in front of them as the town clock chimed seven. Beside him, his brother cocked his head and gave him an invisible smile.  
 


End file.
